Kol Nidre, Central Synagogue- Wednesday September 15, 2021 8PM

[Music] [Music] [Music] uh [Music] um [Music] so [Music] so [Music] so [Music] so [Music] so [Music] so [Music] erev tov everyone it is wonderful to see you i love that it always takes me a long time to get you all in your seats because you are so happy to see each other and i might invite people to come in a little bit into the center if they'd like we know that we are not going to be at capacity today and if someone is sitting in your seat i it is cole nidre please be nice to them we begin together on page 86 like no other prayer cole nidre compels our presence and not just us alone but the memorized outline two of younger years the gentle feel of those who tucked us in who blessed our days consoled our nights and came as we do on this eve with memories of their own we tonight are memories in the making warming seats for others who will remember us in some call me they shall hear when we are gone two among us are memories more recent of what we did or said or were or weren't since last year at this time of what we learnt or lost of kisses that we gave or got the laugh that love is recognized the days of empty wandering and wondering where god was or knowing with compelling certainty that god was with us even in despair colny dre harbors memory of all this its melody persists insists demands and summons our acknowledgment of time what we recall of others past and what we vow to leave behind for others still to come who will remember us kindle this memorial light for those we loved and those we lost for all we miss from the year now gone let us prepare for colney dre our song of memory [Music] [Music] ah [Music] am [Music] um [Music] [Music] [Music] right [Music] oh [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] ah [Music] [Music] i [Music] yes [Music] ah [Music] [Music] hey [Music] ah [Applause] [Music] [Music] foreign [Music] you [Music] [Music] properly tremendous gratitude to our very gifted central member julian schwartz for the gift of his music every year we now are so pleased to bring in the light of this festival and i'm so happy to have my family come up on the bema jacob gabriel eli and rose to light the festival candles we begin on page 87. [Music] [Applause] [Music] hardly [Music] me [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] well somehow it feels that all is right with the world that we have you back here in the sanctuary so many of you that we have our rabbi emeritus with us on the bema peter it is so good to be with you to have started with the glorious strains of that broke cole nidre with julian and wait until you hear our cantor we know that this service this cole nidre there is something so incredible about how this brings us back all of you here and i want to acknowledge all of you who are here our members our neighbors and our live streamers from all around the world it brings us back to our memory back to our tradition and i hope to our best selves as we hear these ancient words and these ancient melodies let us have them open up the gates and open up our hearts so we may do the work of this holiday we continue with the call to worship on page 88 please rise [Music] [Applause] oh [Music] my [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] we continue reading together at the bottom of the page blessed are you eternal god from whom the evening flows we find you in the mysteries of time the passage of seasons the night sky and all its wonders you roll light away from darkness and darkness from light causing day to pass and twilight to fall baruch blessed are you o god from whom the evening flows in just a moment we'll recite shema together but we have to note that on all other days of the jewish calendar we recite the second line of the shema quietly to ourselves here on yom kippur for this day alone we recite this second line out loud in full voice in recognition of the ancient temple and at a time when the high priest would stand before the crowds who had gathered for the yom kippur ritual and when that high priest would recite the name of god to which the entire house of israel would respond loudly so tonight we walk in the ways of our ancestors uniting our voices and memories with generations past and so we close our eyes and sing out these words that have bound jews together and jews with their god for millennia [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] my [Applause] please be seated on page 92 we continue together you shall love your eternal god with all your mind with all your strength and with all your being set these words which i command you this day upon your heart teach them faithfully to your children speak of them in your home and on your way when you lie down and when you rise up find them as a sign upon your hand let them be a symbol before your eyes and inscribe them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates be mindful of all my mitzvot and do them so shall you consecrate yourselves to your god i am your eternal god who led you out of egypt to be your god i am your eternal god someone asked why in our jewish worship services do we continually remind ourselves of these moments in the life of our people and rabbi abraham joshua heschel responded we're a people in whom the past ends yours in whom the present is inconceivable without moments gone by the exodus lasted a moment a moment enduring forever what happened once upon a time happens all the time and so as we rejoice in our freedom and prepare to sing mikha together we learn to yearn for the freedom of all who are in chains page ninety-three [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] i [Music] oh [Music] [Music] [Music] we ask god to watch over us the people we love with a sheltering presence of peace [Music] i shalom [Music] foreign [Music] [Applause] [Music] shalom [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Applause] [Music] [Music] foreign [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] hello [Music] [Music] tonight we face our nakedness mirrored contemplations of concealed selves laid bare of artifice backdrop to a cavernous silence broken only by the quiet chant of colney dre this is the time when consciousness colludes with conscience to shatter the delusions with which we cloak our souls tonight god asks us where and what we are we creatures fashioned in god's goodness are capable of cruelty we vessels of god's holiness litter others lives with profanities of speech and deed and will the nakedness of colony dre's call can pierce our metal unsettling us with echoes of the chaos that we have created and caused the brokenness of loved ones at whose lives we chipped away give us pause to recognize how every year we choose again to grow more worn and withered dry inside or stronger older far more resolute awake to what should matter most which shall it be colney dre sounds especially pure to souls who have lost their way or find themselves enmeshed in webs of hopelessness god disentangle us we pray when where we have sinned remove the shame of self and make us worthy of cole nidre's melody please rise [Music] [Laughter] bye [Music] [Music] ah [Music] um [Music] [Music] [Music] foreign [Music] [Applause] [Music] how do i open up my lips that my mouth may declare your praise how do i open up my lips that my mouth may declare your praise [Applause] i [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] that my mouth may declare your praise [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] hello [Music] hello [Music] [Music] hey [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] m [Applause] lemon [Music] r [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] remember us remember oh [Music] [Music] foreign is [Music] we continue on page 98 together adonai our god is merciful and gracious endlessly patient loving and true showing mercy to thousands forgiving iniquity transgression and sin and granting pardon [Music] [Applause] [Music] for [Music] [Music] is [Music] [Applause] [Music] is [Applause] [Music] i can't [Music] [Music] [Music] then [Music] our god god of our mothers and fathers grant that our prayers may reach you do not be deaf to our pleas for we are not so arrogant and stiff-necked as to say before you our god and god of all ages we are perfect and have not sinned rather do we confess we have gone astray we have sinned we have transgressed [Music] [Laughter] [Music] [Music] oh [Laughter] [Music] foreign [Music] my [Laughter] oh [Music] oh [Music] i [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] i [Music] sorry [Music] oh [Music] i [Music] sorry [Music] we abuse we betray we are cruel we we destroy bitter we falsify we gossip we hate we insult we jeer we kill we lie we mock we neglect we oppress we rebel we steal we transgress we are unkind we are violent we are wicked we are extremists we yearn to do evil we are zealous for bad causes for all of these sins o god of mercy forgive us pardon us grant us atonement [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] um [Music] for the sins we have committed against you through arrogance and selfishness [Music] for the sins we have committed against you through greed and over indulgence for the sins we have committed against you through hardening our hearts for the sins we have committed against you through hypocrisy for the sins we have committed against you by narrow mindedness [Music] for the sins we have committed against you through empty confession for all these sins o god of mercy forgive us pardon us grant us atonement [Music] [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] oh [Music] please be seated hear our voice adonai our god be kind sympathize with us willingly and lovingly accept our prayer turn us toward you adonai and we will return to you make our days seem fresh as they once were do not cast us away from you do not take your holy presence from us do not cast us away as we grow old do not desert us as our life ends do not abandon us adonai our god do not distance yourself from us give us your help and comfort hear our words adonai and consider our innermost thoughts in the words of my mouth and the meditations of my heart be acceptable to you adonai my rock and my redeemer [Music] [Laughter] [Laughter] [Music] know i [Laughter] [Music] [Laughter] [Music] [Laughter] [Music] [Music] who may call [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] so [Music] to feel loved [Music] [Music] a shiver [Laughter] [Music] oh [Music] good [Music] [Music] we continue in silence [Music] [Music] [Laughter] [Music] r [Music] hey [Applause] [Music] foreign [Music] r [Music] [Applause] r [Music] oh [Music] man [Music] we continue together on page 103 the accident of mortality makes life an interim of expulsion as quick and dust and ashes bookended by eternities we were thrust at birth onto a stage as actors unprepared for roles we never sought to have with every day's performance we edge closer to the final bow but we jews are well practiced in the art of exile out to be at peace wherever we may be secured by goodness love and learning gratitude and dignity empathy for suffering integrity and kindness these are the bricks and mortar of authentic jewish coming home so return return to these carnegie charges before lights go out and stage is darkened tonight the world of things events and expectations retreats from consciousness that we may honestly confront what we have been where we have gone what we are worth and if we have failed we pray that at this time tomorrow night when our doors open for naila our final service of these days of ah we may reclaim the promise we once knew we had tonight at home with god and with one another we pause for clarity of purpose on route to that rebirth we will invite our torahs to come back home to their ark and we ask you all to please rise [Laughter] [Music] oh [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] oh [Music] my last [Music] is [Music] oh [Music] is [Music] [Music] [Music] r this horror [Music] [Music] oh [Music] indeed [Laughter] [Music] oh [Laughter] [Music] [Music] [Music] oh [Music] is [Music] himself [Applause] dream [Music] oh [Music] [Music] [Music] one [Music] it's [Music] me [Music] [Music] foreign [Music] [Music] um [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] please be seated the brand new rabbi was at a loss every shabbat when the congregation got to the shema a fight erupted half the congregation was standing and half of them would be seated stand up yelled the standers don't you know this is the most important prayer sit down yelled the sitters don't you know jewish law one day the new rabbi learned that there was a founding member of the congregation who was still alive so he brought a representative from each faction to the home of the 103 year old man surely he would be able to help settle the dispute one side asked the old man isn't it the tradition to stand for the shema no that is not the tradition he said aha said one of the sitters so we must all be seated for the shema no that is not the tradition please cry the young new rabbi to the old man just tell us what to do because right now my congregation just fights all the time one of them debating with the other where they should sit or stand exactly interrupted the old man that is the tradition now this is an old jewish joke but if you've ever served on a synagogue ritual committee right peter am i right you know how true it is this is why he got rid of committees now jews are famously opinionated argumentative stiff-necked it's a cultural disposition that goes back millennia now after the destruction of the temple in jerusalem when we could no longer commune with god by animal sacrifice we found a new pathway through rigorous debate modern judaism as we know it was created in a crowded noisy bait midrash where study became a divine calling never a solitary project jews learn in pairs called havruta and the most legendary havruta of the entire talmudic period was between the learned rabbi yochanan ben zakai who was head of the academy and laquish who was once a bandit had no formal education but was insatiably curious and street smart i want you to imagine albert einstein sitting down to study with al capone they were an odd couple but they were perfectly matched sparring partners because reshta kish was unafraid to challenge jochen and they always argued respectfully except for one time when yohanan called up lakisha's sordid past as an outlaw lakish was so upset he took gravely ill and died jochen was inconsolable so his community brought him a brilliant new hivruta it seemed like a perfect match every time that rabbi yochanan would argue a point his hebrewta would find a text to agree with him it only took a few days before rabbi yochanan was exasperated i don't need you to tell me i'm right i already think i'm right he complained when i used to argue a point reish laquish would counter it with 24 other arguments and now we would eventually get to where the the idea became clear to both of us where are you raesh lakish he cried in anguish but of course reish lakish was gone the talmudic story ends when rabbi yochanan loses his mind and he too dies you've got to love rabbinic legend now when i heard that story i finally understood the famous expression two jews three opinions that saying always perplexed me if the joke is supposed to remind us that jews always disagree it would suffice to say two jews two opinions where does that third opinion come from the story of yochanan and reish lakisha's hebrewta teaches us they would each argue their points until the matter became clear to both of them in other words they came to a third opinion only by listening to opposing views could they arrive at a conclusion that transcended either of their original positions now we sometimes lament two jews three opinions hurts us in the jewish community divides us but it is most certainly a feature not a bug it is in fact an intentional way that rabbinic judaism defined itself against early christianity in 325 ce a council of christian bishops codified a doctrine called the nicene creed it established uniform beliefs and practices mandated across the christian world now contrast that to our code of jewish law called the talmud also codified in the 4th century which decidedly did not establish uniform practices or beliefs instead the talmud reads like a transcript of greatest rabbinic arguments on legal matters it deliberately includes the minority position as well as the majority and it often answers a question with another over time the inquiries and the commentaries of the great rabbinic thinkers would be written in the margins so that when you study a page of talmud today you can even argue jewish law with rabbis across the centuries the talmud doesn't give us a creed to believe it gives us a process for how jews should debate and refine and finally come to our own beliefs the struggle for knowledge itself is holy now i know that engaging with those who challenge or oppose us is not easy we fight it with every fiber of our beings which is why the talmud warns us what could happen if we are not willing to engage in another story about reish lakish two rabbis are headed to the town of asea in order to set the lunar calendar with the right leap months resh lakish asks if he can help them and so the three rabbis set off together along the way questions several things that the two rabbis permitted as they walked his inquiries persisted and persisted the rabbis grew so frustrated with him that when they arrived at asea they climbed to the roof of the building pulled up the ladder behind them and set the calendar without him now i get why they did it when someone challenges us over and over it's hard not to feel bothered and annoyed maybe even threatened it can feel good to climb up to some high place with our allies and pull up the ladder to avoid engaging with anyone who disagrees with us but where does that leave us comfortable and happy maybe but also stranded and isolated those two rabbis on the roof they never appear in the talmud again they disappear they become irrelevant whereas resh lakeish goes on to become the steve jobs of jewish learning rabbi yochanan and rachel accused were willing to sit in the discomfort of their dissent and even doubt because they knew that their debates were in service of something much greater than themselves now i know all of this is much easier to preach than it is to practice in real life and i experience some of this discomfort myself recently last may i traveled to israel on a uga mission of new york rabbis right after the ceasefire israeli jews described to us their terror of having to rush their families into bomb shelters in the middle of the night palestinians and jews who had worked for years to create a shared society saw their fragile trust shattered overnight i felt like i was there to sit shiva with the country in the midst of all of this a letter signed by 90 american rabbinical students made front page news in israel they signed from conservative reconstructionist pluralistic and yes reform seminaries i understood why they were upset i too feel frustrated by the continued occupation and its costs but i was struck by how the letter accused israel of violent suppression of human rights and quote enabling apartheid i was also struck by what the letter didn't say it was silent on the terrorist leadership of hamas and its four thousand rockets it was devoid of any historical context and there was not one expression of compassion or empathy for israeli jews i was angry and embarrassed that in this moment these students would choose to send this message before i filed the letter away and i'm not proud of this i thought to myself i would not want to hire anyone who signed that letter but i also knew that dismissing these students was not the answer it wasn't very rabbinic on my part and it wasn't very jewish i was pulling up the ladder on a large swath of future jewish leaders and i'm not just talking about those rabbinical students but our own kids too so many of you have told me that it's become impossible for you recently to have a conversation with your children or your grandchildren about israel but the answer is not to shut the next generation down but to engage with them more deeply to listen to them and push back and wrestle until the matter becomes clearer to everyone the future of our jewish community depends on it and i dare say the future of our democracy will depend on our ability to do this as well i cannot think of a more important time in our country to promote the jewish value of vigorous respectful disagreement than right now our world has become frighteningly polarized you're either with me or against me on the left or on the right democrat or republican msnbc or fox news but we know there should always be more than just two opinions these positions are not just what we think they've actually become our identities in a recent pew report they found that it was significantly more important to jews that their future grandchildren share their political convictions than marry someone jewish think about that in identity politics whether you identify as a person of color or a socialist or a conservative or a zionist these communities often mandate that you take on a whole platform of beliefs wholesale the price of belonging is toeing the line but let's remember what our tradition teaches not what to believe but how we get to beliefs worth holding questioning is sacred dissent is productive if you start to debate you may discover something that transcends the binary you may discover a third opinion and it will inevitably be wiser than either of the first two on this day of atonement in our restless return to our best selves consider committing to this core jewish practice seek out a havruta in your life not just the friend who tells you that you're right but a real sparring partner like lakish where the goal of your interrogation is not winning the battle but elevating your understanding where the baseline is decency and giving someone the benefit of the doubt this year instead of turning away from those difficult conversations could we with humility speak to that friend who was not comfortable getting vaccinated asked your colleague why she opposes the right to an abortion inquire why your neighbor supports defunding the police ask your fellow congregant why he supports a one-state solution having these conversations will make our democracy better it will make our country better and it will make each of us better we saw that with the greatest minds in the rabbinic era with yochanan and reshla quiche and we also saw it 2000 years later with two of the greatest legal minds of our era justice antonin scalia and justice ruth bader ginsburg this saturday we will be marking the one-year yard site of justice ginsburg i remember so vividly hearing the news of her death right after heir of rosh hashanah services last year scalia and ginsburg had great affection for each other they were both native new yorkers best opera buddies and new year's eve revelers for 30 years with their families but they also disagreed on virtually every substantive issue from same-sex marriage to abortion to the voting rights act scalia famously said of ginsburg what's not to like except her views on the law in the landmark virginia military institute case which allowed women to attend this historically male institution ginsburg authored a capstone opinion in her long career devoted to gender equality there was only one dissenter scalia now when scalia died in 2016 justice ginsburg deeply mourned the loss of her great hevruta at his memorial she recalled their vehement disagreement on the vmi case but she praised how he disagreed scalia had given her a preview of his draft descent full of barbs and disdainful footnotes ginsburg said he absolutely ruined my weekend but my opinion was ever so much better because of his stinging descent they might not have changed each other's thinking but they made each other think better does not promote blind faith or uniform beliefs struggling for truth is a way of engaging with god that is literally what our name means israel one who struggles with the divine so let us all be seekers of wisdom and understanding modeling a different kind of discourse one that our ancestors took as a sacred pursuit one that they knew was a path to authentic belief [Music] the meditation of [Music] be acceptable before you [Music] my god my rock and my redeemer [Music] foreign [Music] [Music] is [Music] [Applause] they may i'm [Music] we turn now to avinu malcano found on page 106 please rise please join with me aveenu malkenu hear our voice we have sinned against you have compassion on us and on our children avinu make an end to sickness war and famine avinu malcanu make an end to all oppression of inscribe us for blessing in the book of life let the new year be a good year for us be gracious and answer us for we have little merit treat us generously and with kindness and be our help [Music] [Music] foreign [Music] oh [Music] oh [Music] foreign [Music] foreign [Music] [Music] [Music] calling [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] um [Music] oh [Music] [Applause] [Music] please be seated i hope that you are able to have met our new president dr shawnee silverberg on rosh hashanah when she greeted our congregation she is a brilliant doctor and a truly extraordinary human being i could not be more fortunate that she has chosen to serve our congregation as our president our leader and i want to invite her up she's already here to share a few words oh wait a second sorry they're trying to train me it's it's difficult i don't take direction very well and i'm very short in case any of you didn't notice so they're trying to get me so that people can hear me anyway it is wonderful to see all of you here and it is wonderful to not see but to know that all of you are there i happen to know that the website didn't crash tonight but there are a lot of people live streaming there is nothing in my background that suggests that i would ever serve as synagogue president never mind as president of one of the largest congregations in what we canadians fondly called the states growing up in montreal in the mid 50s and 60s i attended a zionist socialist day school where we learned english and french subjects in the morning and yiddish in hebrew in the afternoon we read the tanakh the hebrew bible as a quasi-historical document i was one of only two kids in my class whose parents didn't have a number tattooed on their arm and we never attended synagogue my jewishness was everywhere around me in our family in school in camp in our pride in the new nation of israel synagogues just wasn't important i didn't need a jewish home at least not one outside of my parents house and that of our insular montreal jewish community fast forward in new york the jewish community was more synagogue based my husband and i were a jewishly rootless young family with two kids and we felt that it was important to affiliate we while we were synagogue shopping rabbi rick jacobs then senior rabbi of westchester reform temple asked us if we would mind hosting a new rabbinic and cantorial intern in our home for the year he promised that she would not be any trouble and that he would she would teach our children zack and nathaniel in exchange and then he introduced us to angela buchdall no trouble indeed so like many of you i found my jewish home here at central to me at least one of the greatest things about central is that people love it for so many different reasons some of us are here because of our long family association with the synagogue we grew up here we have wonderful and precious memories for generations from central others never belonged to a synagogue before some came for the music especially you guys up in the balcony others for the clergy and still others for programs that educate our members and live streamers from the ages of 2 to 92. some joined because our community welcomed them when others did not and this year more than any other many of you out there think of central as your jewish home despite the fact that you may never have stepped foot in our sanctuary and may instead be in san diego los angeles nashville or martha's vineyard to mention four cities where my relatives live streamed rosh hashanah or in one of 87 countries around the globe where our services are available online regardless of how you came to central or why you love it this institution depends on your support last year at this time we were six months into a pandemic that we all hoped would be in our rear view mirror by the time we got together to atone in 2021 and while we are clearly in a better place we are definitely not done yet we have been so ably led through this crisis by angela rabbi buchdal our spiritual leader and by the indomitable marsha caban and her staff who keep the synagogue functioning and excellent in every way as john may who is i think over there one of our beloved officers described central in the pandemic while we were apart central bot brought us together central's clergy and staff worked tirelessly to shape-shift and innovate creating new worship experiences and new versions of old worship experiences and old programs to keep us in touch these innovations were only possible because we already had the infrastructure and then were able to provide the resources to support them we are so grateful to you our members and our live stream donors who stepped up to support us last year unfortunately as the pandemic crisis actually improves we're seeing increased rather than decreased needs and costs for central when we found out that david geffen hall would not be available to us this year and would actually be downsized with the renovation we committed to radio city to provide an option for in-person worship and two weeks later the delta variant hit but i am pleased to report that i've just come from radio city and we had a nice crowd of about 500 people not a radio city capacity crowd but it was a lovely crowd of worship worshipers at radio city and as disappointing as it is that more could not worship in person we couldn't imagine not offering our congregants an option and an opportunity to get to to come together for worship if public health conditions permitted we've also have increased costs with what i'm calling the dual option we're not in a covered lockdown thankfully where everything is only online but everything isn't all normal either so instead we are investing significantly this year in making both in-person and online options the best they can be so we're investing and we're making sure that you all here in the sanctuary have a wonderful experience but we are also investing in a high production value for our online which the community that comes to us by live stream has come to expect similarly we're offering hebrew school online and in person for all 600 of our students because we believe it is essential to engage and educate the next generation even at an increased cost and the same dual options will exist for our adult programming as well finally with the sad but clear increase in anti-semitism in our country and in our city as a highly visible congregation we need to and we are investing more in our security so this year we hope all of you will again step up we need all of you to again step up central has been there for us and central will be there for us i ask you think about your central moment a time this year when central has been there for you was it when you woke up one day and realized that you actually had a meditation practice even though you would always sworn that meditation was just not for you or when your grandchild called to tell you that one-on-one hebrew lessons with their central hebrew teacher was the best school ever or when your child's bhat mitzvah was more meaningful than you would ever imagine despite despite strict covet restrictions or as is the case for many of our members and our live streamers when you are able to say kaddish for a loved one as part of a community i'll share my central moments first listening to my 90 plus year old father belting out the eleno from the the recliner in his berkshires home singing along with our clergy second weeping as angela sang lechitlach under the hoopa at my son zachary and his bride sky's wedding 30 people on the front lawn instead of the 300 we had planned and finally hearing the yiddish partisan song at my dad's recent funeral central has been there for me and my family and central will be there for you we need you to support central so central can support you if when and how you needed to if i have learned anything as a physician during this pandemic it is that we must anticipate the unexpected central has shown itself to be nimble in response to the events of the last 18 months and i am sure that more nimbleness will be required of us i feel certain that we are up to the task i look forward to working with each and every one of you to support rabbi book doll and our wonderful clergy and staff as we move from strength to strength i wish each of you and your families a year of health and peace thank you very much so now you know that my relationship with shawnee began when i was a 22 year old squatter in her house i've come a long way together just a few announcements that tomorrow we will be back here at 10 a.m and also for all of our live streamers services are at 10 a.m tomorrow morning and we would invite you if you'd like to stay with us all day long yes we have not only a morning service and an afternoon service but across the street in our community house we will have a one o'clock uh quiet meditation with beautiful music and we will have a study session with rabbi rick jacobs at 2 30 and at all times there will be our project of sharing our stories which is an archive project of capturing the incredible stories of people in our community so we hope you'll take a few moments or stay all day and then stay on for our afternoon service for tomorrow i just want to say that it is really amazing to be back here with you i had to hold myself back from crying when i walked down the aisle and saw all of your faces and saw you up close it really so moving to be back with you all and um [Music] it was hard not to smile through the whole service if i have to say i just have to say one thing in a really beautiful service which is if you ever want to know proof for the existence of god i will give you exhibit a cantor dan mutler's voice really it is an other worldly voice and he can do things that you're you shouldn't be able to do with your voice and it's and he's super human and really you lifted all of our voices up today it was incredible and um and really wonderful to sit sit with you peter always in this house that you built so we are now going to turn to our moment of memory before that a reading found on page 108 birth is a beginning and death a destination and life is a journey from childhood to maturity and youth to age from innocence to awareness and ignorance to knowing from foolishness to discretion and then perhaps to wisdom from weakness to strength or strength to weakness and often back again from health to sickness and back we pray to health again from offense to forgiveness from loneliness to love from joy to gratitude from pain to compassion and grief to understanding from fear to faith from defeat to defeat to defeat until looking backward or ahead we see that victory lies not at some high place along the way but in having made the journey stage by stage a sacred pilgrimage birth is a beginning and death a destination and life is a journey a sacred pilgrimage to life everlasting may the memory of our loved ones be an abiding blessing we rise together now for kadisha tom yitzka dal viet kadash so is [Music] amen [Music] is [Music] who we are [Music] is [Music] rules [Music] i want to invite my colleagues up to join us and shani for our closing song together page 110 i know this last verse is one of peter's favorites [Music] my hand i have you entrusted my spirit in your hand god is with me i will not be afraid [Music] oh [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] foreign [Music] is [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Applause] good job [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] do [Music] do [Applause] [Music] do [Music] so [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] you

Channel: Central Synagogue

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Length: 117min 15sec (7035 seconds)

Published: Thu Sep 16 2021